Whose needs is your Back-to-School Sunday really meeting? By Meghan Hatcher, Innovation Lab Director When I began a new ministry role as Community Engagement Pastor midway through the summer, my first major project was to plan and lead Back-to-School Sunday. Like many churches, the congregation I was now serving had a tradition of providing […]
Snow Plow Parenting By Rev. Regina Girten I remember the first time my daughter fell while learning to walk. Our house was not carpeted and as I watched her tiny body topple over my heart skipped several beats. My instinct was to plunge forward, scoop her up and ensure she was ‘booboo’ free. But as […]
Welcome to Youth Group! Helping Students and Parents Transition Into Youth Ministry By Andrew Davis As youth pastors, we must be intentional about how we welcome our new 6th or 7th graders into the youth ministry. Church involvement can be a very positive aspect of the lives of new middle schoolers. This is also a […]
Successful Retreat Planning 101 If you’re planning a retreat this year, use this free guide to make sure you’ve got your bases covered–whether it’s your first or hour one hundred and first event! Prayer and Purpose: Why? Begin in prayer with your ministry team about the purpose of your retreat or camp. […]
Urban Youth Worker as Relationship Builder by William Parker In the Search Institute’s report on Positive Developmental Relationships, Peter L. Benson writes, “After decades of forming hypotheses, conducting surveys, crafting and rewriting definitions, analyzing data, and writing journal articles, Search Institute researchers and practitioners have arrived at a surprisingly simple conclusion: nothing–nothing–has more impact in […]
By Anastasia Pumphrey Trinity UMC in Homewood, Alabama, hosted its most successful and golf tournament scholarship fundraiser to date on August 5, and this year it was led by a current CYMT resident! Rhys Ferguson, class of 2024, has been attending TUMC and Element Youth Ministry since he was a youth himself and now […]
“Not just a beloved program, but a way of being in all of our programs”: Reflections on a Lab cohort one year later By Meghan Hatcher We emphasize process over product and transformation over traditional ministry metrics at the Innovation Lab. That’s why we guide Innovation Teams through our five-phase, multi-month Theological Innovation Process […]
8 Tips for Keeping Youth Involved and Listening Let’s just be honest with the fact that not every lesson is going to be a success, and sometimes we will lose our youth. It’s important to always be aware of what’s going on in the room (whether youth are sleeping, texting, talking to each other, looking […]
Understanding the WOW Theological Method By Dietrich “Deech” Kirk I was walking down the row of hungry people when a man said to me, “Hey, I know you.” And that statement transformed my life. We arrived at The Bridge early. Everyone was given a role in helping to feed the 500 homeless […]
“The Kid Who Questions Everything” by Cory Peacock There’s an old Calvin and Hobbes comic strip, written and drawn by the comic genius Bill Watterson, in which the precocious six-year-old Calvin has a nice father-son talk about things scientific. Calvin asks, “Where does the sun go when it sets?” Calvin’s dad responds, “The sun sets […]
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